Definely Releases its LegalTech Adoption Report 2025

Definely, a leading provider of LegalTech solutions for drafting, reviewing, and understanding legal documents, has released its 2025 LegalTech Adoption Report, shedding light on how artificial intelligence (AI) and related technologies are influencing legal workflows.

Key Insights from the Report

• Security and Confidentiality: 64% of legal professionals identify security and confidentiality as top concerns when considering AI adoption.
• AI Adoption Disparities: In the UK, 46% of in-house lawyers feel they are lagging law firms in AI adoption, indicating a clear gap in technological advancement within the legal sector.
• Satisfaction with LegalTech Investments: Only 22% of UK respondents express satisfaction with the return on investment (ROI) from LegalTech, compared to 51% in the US, highlighting regional differences in perceived value.
• Comfort Levels with Generative AI: Half of corporate counsel remains uncomfortable using generative AI (GenAI), reflecting ongoing scepticism about AI’s role in legal processes.
• Barriers to Adoption: Budget constraints (50%) and integration challenges (41%) are cited as significant hurdles to adopting LegalTech solutions, underscoring the need for cost-effective and seamlessly integrable technologies. 

The Trust Gap in AI

Despite advancements, a trust gap persists among legal professionals concerning AI’s accuracy and reliability:

• Accuracy Concerns: 75% of respondents cite accuracy and reliability as primary issues with AI-generated legal work, emphasising the profession’s demand for precision.
• Resistance to Change: Over a third of respondents remain sceptical about the benefits of AI adoption, indicating cultural and educational barriers to technology acceptance.

Feargus MacDaeid, Co-Founder and Chief Strategy Officer at Definely, underscores these concerns: “In a field where a single word can change the entire meaning of a contract or verdict, an 80% accuracy simply isn’t good enough. The deeper question is whether the improvement in these models is sufficient to justify the cost, especially when considering the potential for error propagation in complex legal scenarios.”

Impact on In-House Teams and External Counsel Relationships

The report highlights a shift in how LegalTech influences the dynamics between in-house legal teams and external counsel:

• Self-Sufficiency: More legal teams are adopting self-serve technologies to reduce reliance on external counsel for routine tasks, aiming to cut costs and increase efficiency.
• Strategic Collaboration: While automation is on the rise, many still view external legal expertise as essential for high-value strategic matters, suggesting a complementary relationship between technology and human expertise.

Looking Ahead

The Definely LegalTech Adoption Report provides a comprehensive overview of the current state of AI and LegalTech in the legal industry, offering valuable insights for firms and legal departments navigating this transformative landscape.

Addressing security, accuracy, and integration concerns will be critical for broader acceptance and effective implementation in legal workflows as AI evolves.

For a deeper dive into these findings and more, download the full report from Definely’s official website.

About Definely

Definely is a leading provider of LegalTech solutions for drafting, reviewing, and understanding legal documents. Its products, delivered as a Microsoft Word add-in, integrate into a lawyer’s existing workflow and allow users to access essential information—such as definitions or clause references—both within and across multiple documents, enabling them to understand clauses or provisions without losing context.